Niger: Floods - Jul 2012

Glide: FL-2012-000141-NER

Overview

Heavy rains caused flooding in various parts of Niger starting at the end of July 2012 as part of the rainy season. By October, at least 91 people had been killed and 530,000 affected by floods, which hit the Tillabery region of the land-locked country hardest. Additional flooding occurred in November and December with the additional seasonal rise of rivers, which had already reached unusually high levels in October, forcing people affected by earlier flooding to relocate/evacuate yet again and posing challenges to relief activities. (IFRC, 14 Dec 2012)

As communities in Niger continue to recover from flooding that took place last summer, we hear from response team volunteer David Hatcher about the challenges of providing aid in the West African country.

In August 2012, Niger received more than half a year’s rainfall in just one night and experienced the worst flooding in living memory. The River Niger burst its banks and the rising waters destroyed 14,000 homes, along with 7,000 crop fields, leaving people without shelter or food supplies.

In West Africa, market supplies improved throughout the region in October due to average ongoing harvests. Carryover stocks were average to above-average in Mali, Burkina Faso, and Benin but below-average in many areas of the Niger and Nigeria due to the effects flood and conflict that disrupted the marketing system in 2012 and early 2013. Stable rice imports from international markets contributed to food availability in Senegal and Mauritania (Pages 3-5).

Food security and nutrition in the Sahel have improved somewhat since the acute crisis in 2012, following better rains and harvests. However, the effects of the recent crisis are not so quickly erased.

DAKAR/NIAMEY, 13 June 2013 (IRIN) - West African and Sahel countries are setting up measures to minimize flood damage as the annual rainy season approaches. The African Centre of Meteorological Applications for Development (ACMAD) in a seasonal weather outlook says near-average or above-average rainfall is likely over the western Sahel, which stretches across Mauritania, Senegal and western and central Niger.

In Syria, the government military continued its offensive on opposition-controlled Qusayr, a strategic city in Homs province connecting the capital to the Mediterranean coast. Humanitarian agencies expressed alarm over the fate of thousands of civilians still trapped in the city. The UN estimates that over 6.8 million people are in need of humanitarian aid in Syria. While an estimated 5 million people are internally displaced, the number of Syrians registered or awaiting registration in host countries has surpassed 1.6 million.

Geneva/Niamey (ICRC) – Several hundred families fleeing violence in northern Nigeria and taking refuge in the Diffa area of south-eastern Niger are being provided with emergency supplies and food aid by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the Red Cross Society of Niger.

Displaced by disasters: 32.4 million people uprooted in both rich and poor countries

**GENEVA, 13 MAY 2013 – A new report released today by the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC) reveals that 32.4 million people were forced to flee their homes in 2012 by disasters such as floods, storms and earthquakes. While Asia and west and central Africa bore the brunt, 1.3 million were displaced in rich countries, with the USA particularly affected.

Fighting continued unabated throughout Syria, in particular in Hama, Aleppo, Ar-Raqqa, Dar’a, Deir-ez-Zor, Homs, Idleb, Lattakia and around Damascus. 6.8 million people are in need in of humanitarian assistance in the country, 4.25 million people are displaced and over 1.4 million people have fled into neighbouring countries.

6.8 million people are in need in of humanitarian assistance in Syria and the UNHCR has defined the crisis as the worst humanitarian disaster since the end of the cold war. 4.25 million people are displaced and over 1.3 million people have fled into neighbouring countries. Fierce fighting continues across the country and cross-border shelling into Lebanon has intensified over the last days.